


Why Will Volunteered for the Mission

by orphan_account



Series: The Mission [1]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Backstory, Emotional Turmoil, M/M, Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-07
Updated: 2016-11-07
Packaged: 2018-08-29 16:52:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8497870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: This is sort of a triptych that moves from when Will and Nico first met, to Will's developing feelings after the Battle of Manhattan, to just before Will sets out with Cecil and Lou Ellen the morning of the battle with Gaea.





	1. Snowball

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nico's having a great time at Camp Half Blood. Before Bianca died, he was a happy kid!

Completely confident that the epic Percy Jackson would keep his sister safe on the quest, Nico promptly forgot about Bianca. All he and the other camp 11 year-olds cared about was 'Snowball' - a complicated combination of group snowball fight, capture the flag, and cops-and-robbers of their own creation. The object was deceptively simple - 'get' the other team (with snowballs), but you could also kidnap opposite team members and make them fight for your team. Godly powers and magical items were allowed. There was an elaborate points system dreamed up by the Athena kid that no one else really understood, so while points were much sought and discussed (for example, blood could earn or lose points, depending), they were never ultimately tallied. The game always ended at dinner, anyway. 

Nico, being chatty and not at all shy, was effortlessly absorbed into the play. Despite being unclaimed and showing no evidence of any particular godly powers, he quickly earned renown for being quick and stealthy and fearless. He soon became the go-to guy for sneaking up behind enemy lines, taking out the guard kids and freeing any kidnapped team members. 

On his third day at camp, Nico, without tears, took a nefariously rock-embedded snowball to the face, and to the delight of his peers, flew into a rage, sprinting towards the offending Ares kid and landing a punch that broke the kid's nose. Points on both sides rose exponentially as the blood splattered. 

Nico later sat in a snowbank as the Apollo kid in the goofy antique 'ski-doo' pom-pom hat steri-stripped his cheek back together. 

"That was awesome!" the kid was saying, "That guy is a dick." 

Nico grinned at the rude language, his temper gone as quickly as it had come. Pom-pom grinned back and Nico noticed this kid's eyes perfectly matched the deep sparkly blue of that afternoon's winter sky. 

"Thanks," Nico said, tentatively touching his wounded cheek with fingers that were starting to show evidence of a good strong punch. 

The conch horn sounded for dinner. "Come on, Nico, Will!" shouted the other kids, and they all trooped toward the dining pavilion in a chaotic gaggle, all shouting at the same time and shoving each other playfully and throwing arms around shoulders, all red-cheeks and shining eyes. Even the Ares kid agreed today's game had been the best yet.


	2. Heavy Are You On My Mind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will wants to tell Nico how he feels after the Battle of Manhattan. But it doesn't go as planned. Not that he planned it. It definitely doesn't go right....

Will's heart started racing when he realized this was his opportunity to talk to Nico. The striking dark haired boy Will couldn't stop thinking about over the week since the battle was slouched over a cup of something, and the dining pavillion was deserted. Will couldn't believe his luck. He'd just escaped from the infirmary and it was barely dawn. Will always grabbed some breakfast before heading to bed after an infirmary night shift. Usually it was a solitary affair, but here was Nico di Angelo. And it was quiet and private.

Nico didn't look up or acknowledge Will's presence in any way as Will made his way to the serving table. Will's mind raced through conversation options as he piled a couple croissants, some cheese and a bunch of grapes on a plate. He grabbed a cup and turned back to face the dining tables. Nico hadn't disappeared. And no one else had come in. Will was frozen in place debating - do I sit across from him, or beside him? Across? Beside? Across? He forced himself to walk over and to breathe. 

Beside, he decided, as he slid his plate onto the table and stepped over the bench to sit down - but not too close, a whole person-sized space between them.

"Hey," Will muttered in greeting. He didn't want to come on too strong. Nico took his time to look up from what Will could now see was coffee and to turn his face toward Will.

Nico looked like he'd been awake all night too, with black bruises under those oil-black eyes that Percy had once described as glinting with brilliance or madness - maybe both. Gods! How could a single glance take Will's breath away? This kid exuded power so that the air around him constantly thrummed, like the air around a live electric fence, like he was not quite yet in control of how much pure Hades he was channeling at any given time. Will could see how it could be scary - most of the campers admitted they found Nico a bit terrifying - but he found it thrilling, enticing. Will barely admitted to himself a reckless desire to touch Nico to experience what such a life-force would feel like surging into him. 

"Solace," Nico acknowledged. In contrast to his powerful gaze, Nico's voice was quiet and solemn.

Will put in a bit more of an effort and gave half a smile, pushing his plate into the space between them.

"Have some," he offered, before he turned to concentrate on filling his cup with chocolate milk. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Nico's hand, the one with the silver skull ring, reach out to pluck a grape from the bunch. 

Nico didn't lift the grape to his mouth. He just held it gently between his thumb and forefingers, and his hand rested gently on the table beside his cup.

"I came straight from the infirmary," Will explained, though Nico hadn't inquired. Nico nodded, glancing at him again, and then pointing with his grape toward Will's forearm. Will looked down, and noticed the dried splatter of blood between his wrist and elbow. Flustered, he pulled his arm down onto his lap under the table. "Oh, that's gross! Sorry! I did wash my hands," he rushed to explain. 

Nico shrugged and lifted the grape gracefully to his mouth. 

Will tried to corral his wild thoughts. This wasn't working. He couldn't think what to say. He took a long drink of chocolate milk to buy himself some recovery time, unintentionally gulping more than he could swallow, and then spastically tried not to sputter and cough as he put down his cup. "I'm okay," Will gasped, though Nico hadn't really shown any concern, having calmly taken, chewed and swallowed another grape. This was turning out to be just embarrassing. In desperation, Will decided to try for nostalgia. He grabbed a croissant and tore off the flaky corner, placing his elbows on the table, forgetting about his blood stained arm. He turned to look at Nico again.

"Remember Snowball?"

Will watched Nico's eyes flick up to meet his own. Nico looked searchingly into Will's eyes as if he could draw the memory from them. He nodded, and seemed about to smile. 

"Snowball," he mused, "I haven't thought about that in....". Will inadvertently leaned toward Nico, but Nico didn't finish his thought. 

Will followed Nico's gaze out of the dining pavilion to where Percy and Annabeth had come into view, walking hand in hand. They both watched as Percy stopped walking suddenly and pulled Annabeth by the hand into an embrace, sliding his free hand under the back of her t-shirt, holding her close to him for a long kiss.

"That," Will stated, "is pretty much the embodiment of the definition of inevitability, right there..."

He was startled by Nico suddenly pushing away from the table and standing up, his expression pinched and eyes darker, if possible. "I can't be here," he was saying to himself.

"What?" Will was confused.

Nico turned to him, "I gotta go." 

"What? No..." Will started. He wanted to talk about 'Snowball', see the rest of that smile.

"Can I take this?" Nico asked as he grabbed the last croissant and the rest of the grapes. 

Will just gaped at him. What was happening?

Then Nico's voice, in a rush, as if it was something he'd been thinking about and didn't want to forget to say: "I'm sorry about your brothers." 

Will's sucker-punched chest started to flood with pain. Grief that had been simmering below the surface this past week while he concentrated on the wounded threatened to boil over. Shit! He did not want to cry in front of Nico, but the hot tears broke through and started to roll down his cheeks anyway. Nico didn't see. He'd turned again to where Percy and Annabeth were resuming their approach. Will watched as Nico stepped into one of the early morning shadows still scattered through the pavilion and disappeared. 

Shocked, Will's grief twisted into something darker. With a deep growl of rage he jumped up, the bench crashing to the floor. He swiped the plate off the table gratified to hear it shatter against the stone floor. He was about to start bawling like a baby, his hands shaking and his face burning. Will raced out of the dining pavilion, past a startled Percy and Annabeth. The tears coursed down as he ran and ran. He ran until he couldn't breathe, finally collapsing by the big oak tree on the far side of the strawberry fields. He lay on his back and stared into the leafy branches, but the beauty of the leaves in the morning light contrasted too sharply with Will's dark mix of sadness and anger and frustration and breaking heart, and while he wanted to soak in the warmth as he lay there, the only thing he wanted to see was the darkness as he tightly closed his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The emotionality of this chapter was inspired by the excellent song: "Honey" by Torres. In fact, I imagine the lyrics of the song would be exactly what Will would have written as a way to deal with his feelings after Nico disappears. Have a listen to the song. Torres is worth getting to know anyway, if you don't already.


	3. Make Your Own Fate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will is pretty sure he's destined to die in this battle, but, Nico.... Fate tends to bend whenever Nico's involved.

Thanks the gods, that was over! Will hadn't really thought about it before, but now he felt pretty certain that obstetrics was not where his medical career was going. It wasn't like he did anything anyway except catch the baby satyr - Mellie did all the work. And Clarisse. On the other hand, it was pretty amazing to be part of the emergence of new life, and the adrenaline coursing through him was making him shaky. 

Coach Hedge had miraculously made it just before the birth, and it was soon after the birth, after Mellie and baby were deemed well, that Chiron had poked his head in the room, hating to pull the Coach away from his wife and baby, but desperate for any information Hedge could share about the quest and the upcoming battle. "Will, you'd better come too," Chiron said grimly.

In fact, all the head counselors were gathered in the games room of the big house. They all listened intently to the Coach's succinct update. Any moment now the battle would begin. The Athena Parthenos was near and Reyna had plans to deliver it as a peace offering, so long as the Roman onagers could be prevented from attacking her. A couple Roman centurians had been converted to rally to troops against Octavian and disrupt the battle plans as much as possible, and Nico di Angelo was with them. Will's heart jolted at the sound of his secret crush's name, but he kept his expression neutral. 

"If anyone can sneak around and cause damage and mayhem, it's Nico," one of the counsellors said out loud what many of them were thinking. But Coach Hedge was shaking his head.

"That's a problem. Nico doesn't even know it, but he can't do this. He's already done too much. He's got nothing left." 

He briefly told the group about how they had just brought Nico back from the brink of completely fading away. 

Will's heart pounded, "what do you mean 'fading away'? You mean dying?" 

Coach's expression was guarded, "I mean literally fading away, kid. Losing substance. Becoming shadow. I don't know if that's death or not, but..." His voice became fierce, "We gotta get a team out there to get to the Romans and their auxillary forces before that pig-headed son of Hades tries to do it all himself. If he shadow travels one more time..."

"I'll go," Will volunteered. The group collectively looked at him skeptically. Will was the best medic, and he was tough and battle-tested, but he wasn't a top warrior, and he'd been up all night delivering a baby.

"No," he insisted in protest to their looks, "It's right. I'm head of Apollo. I should lead this." 

It wasn't really a convincing argument, but Connor Stoll jumped in. "If we're talking about causing damage, you need a Hermes kid too. Take Cecil." Chiron was nodding. "And someone with fine control of the mist. Maybe Lou-Ellen, from Hecate." More heads nodded in agreement. 

****  
As Will prepared to go, donning dark clothes and blacking his face, he considered his motivations for volunteering for the mission. He was under no illusion that his skills were particularly suited to reconnaissance and sabotage, but there was no way he was going to sit back and wait for the curse to find him. He was going to meet fate head on. The head of Apollo cabin always went down in battle - Lee Fletcher in the battle of the Labyrinth, and then Michael Yew in Manhattan. It was his turn and he was going take it on his own terms, and take down as much of the enemy as possible at the same time. 

And Nico was out there somewhere, not even aware how desperately he needed a healer....


End file.
